MOLDOVA 2008/9

 

Two violent antisemitic incidents were recorded in 2008, both in the unrecognized republic of Transnistria. While Israel’s war in Gaza in late December/early January 2009 triggered almost no increase in antisemitic manifestations, antisemitic remarks appeared on some Internet forums.

 

THE JEWISH COMMUNITY

The Jewish population in Moldova is 13,000 (based on the 2004 population census) out of a population of approximately 4.3 million. While the mixed marriage rate has always been high, local Jews have strong links to the Moldovan Jewish Diaspora in Israel, the US and Germany. The Jews live mostly in Chisinau, the capital of Moldova, and in the second largest town Beltsy, in northern Moldova.

The main Jewish organizations are the Association of Jewish Organizations and Communities of Moldova and the Jewish Congress of Moldova. Others are the Union of Jewish Organizations of Chisinau, the Dor-le-Dor Charity Foundation, the Society of War Veterans, the Khava women’s organization and the Association of Jewish Prisoners of Ghetto and Concentration Camps, as well as branches of the international student organization Hillel and the Maccabi movement.

About a dozen Jewish Chabad-Lubavitch communities operate in Moldova, headed by the chief rabbi of the country. There are also a Chabad-Lubavitch kindergarten, an Agudat Yisrael yeshiva, several Jewish schools and a Jewish pedagogic women’s college in Chisinau, as well as the Enlightenment University of Jewish Culture and a branch of the Open University of Israel. Two Jewish newspapers are published: Evreiskoe Mestechko (Jewish shtetl) and Istoky (Roots).

A lengthy dispute between the Jewish community and the local business company Olmosdon was revived in 2008. The disagreement concerns the right to retain a monument to Jewish victims murdered in 1941 at the old Jewish cemetery in Chisinau versus building a car trading company. Construction work was halted in 2006, but restarted in 2008. Following an appeal by the Jewish community to the authorities and to President Vladimir Voronin, the work was again stopped.

 

POLITICAL BACKGROUND

Since the inception of independence in 1991, and even earlier, there have been debates and controversies concerning Moldovan identity. Two main rival models of identity exist in Moldova today, Moldovanism and pan-Romanianism. Ethnic and national minorities made up 22 percent of Moldova's population, according to the 2004 population census (75.8 per cent of the population considered themselves ethnic Moldovans, while 2.2 percent stated they were ethnic Romanians).

            Supporters of Moldovanism claim that Moldova had a different historical path from Romania and its population did not participate in the process of construction of a modern Romanian identity. Their main focus is to maintain Moldova as an independent state and to stress the multiethnic character of the country.

Supporters of pan-Romanianism concentrate on ethnic and linguistic ties with Romania. They deny a specific history of Moldova and the diversity of its population, and believe the state should undergo a process of Romanization in order to achieve a homogeneous national culture. An important objective of pan-Romanianism in Moldova is to increase cultural links with Romania as a step toward forming a political union. Pan-Romanianism remains a hegemonic ideology in universities and the school system and among a large part of the humanist intelligentsia. The pan-Romanian version of identity, which has been dominant in Moldova since the early 1990s, excludes minority narratives, such as Holocaust history. The Moldovan version of identity is more open to minority narratives, including Holocaust history, and is well accepted among minorities. A pro-Moldovan identity historian Serghei Nazaria, for example, is the author of the book Holocaust in Moldova (see below).

The Communist Party, which came to power in 2001, fostered an inclusive civic Moldovan identity. In addition, in 2001 the law on national minorities was adopted and in 2003 Moldova was officially declared a multiethnic state. The initiative was enthusiastically supported by ethnic and national minorities in Moldova, including the Jewish community; however it was harshly opposed by pro-Romanian oriented humanist intelligentsia and some non-governmental organizations. Jewish education in Yiddish was guaranteed and the issue of Holocaust memory began to enter the public discourse, too.

If during the period of the Soviet Union the issue of the Holocaust in Moldova was silenced, then in the immediate post-Soviet period, Holocaust “revisionism” became a tacitly accepted mainstream view. In recent years, debates about the Holocaust have intensified, although denial of the Romanian Holocaust remains firmly entrenched in mainstream conciousness. Since the beginning of 2000, efforts have been made both at the governmental and non-governmental levels to initiate commemoration of the Holocaust.

 

Extremist and Antisemitic Groups

At least two nationalist antisemitic Legionnaire groups deriving from Romania’s wartime fascist antisemitic Iron Guard exist in Moldova. The Moldovan branch of the New Right organization Noua Dreapta (ND) keeps in close contact with its Romanian counterpart. In 2008 a Romanian delegation of the ND, among them its leader Tudor Ionescu, visited various locations in Moldova, including Chisinau, Orhei and Soroca, to evaluate their activities and strengthen contacts there. ND’s leader in Moldova Sergiu Bacalov is employed at the History Department of the Moldovan Academy of Sciences.

The Legionnaire group headed by Sergiu Lascu organized an annual gathering on Victory Day, celebrated in Moldova on May 9, at the cemetery where Romanian army soldiers from World War II are buried. The pro-Iron Guard Obiectiv Legionar has become available in Moldova and is distributed during such gatherings.

While no political party has a clear racial or antisemitic agenda, several nationalist parties, such as the National Liberal Party (NLP) headed by Vitalia Pavlicenco, the European Action Movement headed by historian Anatol Petrencu and the Liberal Party headed by Mihai Ghimpu, include members with revisionist views. None of the three parties has seats in the parliament; however, in the 2007 local elections the Liberal Party received 18.31 percent in Chisinau municipality and 11 seats on the city council. The ideology of the parties promotes Moldova’s unification with Romania.

Pavlicenco and Petrencu are known as admirers of Romania’s wartime fascist leader Ion Antonescu, who was responsible for the murder of many Jews and Roma during that period. They seek to imbue Moldova with a pan-Romanian ethnic identity and actively promote the cult of Antonescu, who, with his territorial claims, became an important symbol of pan-Romanian ideas. Anatol Petrencu, a nationalist pro-Romanian historian, has been accused repeatedly by other historians, as well as by the Jewish community of distorting the Holocaust. In addition to justifying Antonescu’s crimes and blaming the Germans alone for the Holocaust in some of his works, Petrencu also minimizes the number of victims. He founded the European Action Movement with the purpose of returning the "History of Romanians" course (which reflects an ethno-nationalist line that excludes minorities completely) to the school curriculum (see ASW 2006 and 2007).

With the date of the parliamentary elections announced for April 2009, all three parties and their leaders immediately became actively involved in the pre-election campaign, which was marked by antisemitic expressions. For example, the negative influence on Moldova of presidential advisers Oleg Reidman and Mark Tkachuk, with allusions to their allegedly Jewish roots or closeness to Jewish circles, was stressed by some politicians. Conspiracy theories relating to Tkachuk’s "Jewishness" were circulated on the online forums of various newspapers. Readers of the online version of a leading newspaper, the respected Russian-language Moldavskie vedomosti (Moldovan news), posted remarks such as, "Moldova is poor, because Jews rule Moldova today.” Such comments were not deleted by moderators of the forums. The frequent visits of then Israeli MK Avigdor Lieberman, who was born in Moldova, also inspired such slurs.

Several large-circulation newspapers support the above-mentioned parties both officially and unofficially, including the political aspiration of Moldovan unification with Romania. Literatura si Arta, Timpul de Dimineata and Glasul Natiunii publish articles containing veiled and explicit minority hatred and are notorious for idolizing Antonescu and whitewashing his crimes during World War II. For example, on November 27, Literatura si Arta, an unofficial media platform for Petrencu’s European Action, published an article by professor of engineering Valeriu Dulgheru, entitled "The De-Judaization of Bessarabian Politics.” Attempting to distinguish between religious Judaism and "political Judaism,” he used the word "Judaism" negatively in reference to various political manipulations on the Moldovan right-wing scene.

ANTISEMITIC MANIFESTATIONS

Violent Incidents

Two violent antisemitic incidents were recorded in 2008 (both in Transnistria): on April 19 (the eve of Adolf Hitler's birthday) four ancient tombstones at the Jewish cemetery in Grigoriopol were broken, while on September 6, the Holocaust memorial (erected in 2002) in Bendery was desecrated with swastikas and slogans such as "Death to the Jews,” "The Holocaust is a Myth,” and "Why do Jews have more rights than Russians?" The Jewish community asked the authorities of Transnistria to investigate; however, the perpetrators were never caught. Several days later the local Jewish community organized a seminar, with the participation of local authority representatives, students and journalists to discuss this particular case, as well as antisemitism in Transnistria in general and ways to combat it.

Transnistria, a largely-Russian-speaking, post-Soviet secessionist republic on the border with Ukraine, has equal representation of Russians, Ukrainians and Moldovans. Transnistria seceded from Moldova in 1990, in response to the growth of nationalism and fear of being united with Romania. Although independent de facto, Transnistria remains de jure part of Moldova.

 

Antisemitic Propaganda and Holocaust Distortion

While Israel’s war in Gaza in late December/early January 2009 triggered almost no increase in antisemitic manifestations, antisemitic remarks were reported on some Moldovan Internet forums during this period (see also General Analysis).

The most common form of antisemitism in Moldova is Holocaust distortion, linked to the issue of Romanian participation in World War II and the creation of a pan-Romanian ethnic identity (see also ASW 2006 and 2007). Holocaust distortion in various forms − from outright denial to relativization and trivialization − can be found in the academic, political and media discourse. Hardcore denial is easily identified by the Jewish community and the authorities and condemned, but rarely punished. Relativization and trivialization which is more typical in Moldova and the other post-Soviet republics, is more insidious and difficult to resist. For example, on June 24, Literatura si Arta published a provocative article, "From the History of the ‘Partisan Movement’ in Moldova,” in which it referred to Romanian participation in World War II on the side of Nazi Germany as a "holy war."

Although Moldova has laws against discrimination of minorities and against hate speech in the media, it does not have a specific law against Holocaust denial. While neighboring Romania has taken some important steps at least on the official level in this area, such as the establishment of the Elie Wiesel Commission and recognition of the crimes of Nazi ally Ion Antonescu (see below), Moldova has not followed suit.

 

Antisemitism and Holocaust Denial on the Internet

One of the most popular youth Internet resources in Moldova is curaj.net. It has a political forum and links to various nationalist websites such as romanism.net, which, among others, tend to stress the negative role of the Jews during communism.

Curaj.net belongs to Hyde Park, an NGO founded in 2003. An honorary member of Hyde Park, also known as a long-term apologist of Holocaust revisionism, is Bessarabian−French author and dissident from the Ceausescu period, Paul Goma (see below). During one broadcast in 2003, Hyde Park’s founder Oleg Brega expressed regret that Hitler’s plans for a "Final Solution" were not fully realized. The website promotes Goma’s books.

On July 26, 2008, Hyde Park participated in a meeting in Chisinau Central Park devoted to the "67th anniversary of the liberation of Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina from the occupation of the Russian−Communist fascists.” Participants held posters with photos of Antonescu and old maps of Greater Romania. They signed a declaration stressing the importance of Romanian military involvement in World War II and describing both German Nazi and Romanian fascist front operations as liberation. The declaration demanded an immediate "union of the Romanian lands" and ended with the slogans "Long live the Romanian army! Freedom to Bessarabia! Ion Antonescu is the hero of all Romanians! Long live Greater Romania!" The declaration, photos and videos from the event are available on curaj.net, on Brega’s personal website and on YouTube.

Some other Moldovan websites, such as forum.md and salut.md, often contain messages justifying and even praising the policy of Ion Antonescu toward Jews and Roma. It is believed that nationalist historians from Moldova, but not exclusively, use those Internet forums for expressing their views, which they cannot present publicly.

 

RESPONSES TO ANTISEMITISM AND RACISM

Official and Public Responses

The Moldovan authorities, including President Vladimir Voronin and Speaker of the Moldovan Parliament Marian Lupu, participated, as usual, in the commemorative events, including the events marking Victory Day and the 70th anniversary of Kristallnacht, where they officially condemned antisemitism and xenophobia in Moldova.

Jewish publications such as the Jewish shtetl, the youth newspaper Puls and the weekly Saptamana (Saturday) systematically monitor and condemn manifestations of antisemitism and xenophobia in Moldova. Organizations such as the African society Fatima and the Helsinki Citizens’ Assembly, the main anti-racist organizations in Moldova, monitor racist manifestations and organize events to combat xenophobia and racism, such as the Football against Racism in Europe action week in October 2008.

The Higher Anthropological School in Moldova organized a summer school on hate speech in the media from June 29 to July 4 with the participation of foreign experts and Moldovan and foreign journalists.

In 2008, the director of the Moldovan Museum publishing house and member of the center-right alliance Moldova Noastra (Our Moldova), Yurii Kolesnik, was interrogated by the Office of the Public Prosecutor after the Jewish community lodged a complaint about publication of the antisemitic book Red Week: 23 June-3 July 1940, or Bessarabia and the Jews by Paul Goma. In The Red Week, Goma, who is not a historian, argues, for example, that the Jews of Bessarabia and Bukovina (which today are a part of Moldova and Ukraine) who were murdered during the Holocaust, deserved their fate, because they were guilty of being Communists and carrying out atrocities against Romanians and Romanian soldiers. The protest was made after the book was widely promoted and distributed at the annual book fair held at the Moldovan National Library in 2007 and then sold in Fat Frumos, a central bookshop in Chisinau. The book has since been banned in Moldova.

In its report on Moldova for 2008, the European Commission against Racism and Intolerance of the Council of Europe (ECRI) recommended that the Moldovan authorities monitor all instances of antisemitism and strengthen efforts to punish perpetrators. 

 

Holocaust Commemoration

While Holocaust memorial events have traditionally taken place on the initiative of the Jewish community, steps have been taken by some non-Jewish organizations to commemorate the Shoah as part of the response to antisemitism and racism. Important work in commemorating the Holocaust has been done by the NGO Nemurire, founded in 2001 with the purpose of locating and marking all places where Jews and Roma were murdered during the fascist occupation of Moldova. Thanks to the initiative of this organization, for example, the street in the small Moldovan town of Edinets, where more than 100 Jews were murdered and buried in October 1941, was named after the victims. The contribution of local Moldovans in the villages to building such memorial places should be also stressed.

The 70th anniversary of Kristallnacht was commemorated by the Jewish community of Chisinau. The meeting which took place on November 10, 2008, at the memorial complex of the Chisinau ghetto, was attended by representatives of the local Jewish communities, foreign embassies and the authorities, as well as journalists. President of the Association of Jewish Prisoners of Ghetto and Concentration Camps Shaps Roif said the authorities should pay more attention to the problem of antisemitism in Moldova. "Unfortunately," he said, "in Moldova today some people, even those with academic titles in the history department of the Moldovan State University, engage in antisemitism and deny the Holocaust."

An international conference, "The Role of Historical Memory and Lessons of the Holocaust in the Education of Today’s Youth,” was organized by the Center for Training and Professional Careers, with the support of the American Jewish Committee. More than three hundred people attended, including students, teachers, scientists, representatives of Jewish organizations from Moldova, Israel, Romania and Ukraine, and representatives of the Moldovan government. Among the speakers were historian and Wiesel Commission member from Romania Lia Benjamin, director of the Ukrainian Centre for Holocaust Studies Anatoly Podolsky, and Moldovan historian Serghei Nazaria, who published the first book on the Holocaust in Moldova with the support of the Jewish community in 2005.

In November 2008 a conference on different interpretations of history, including the issue of the Holocaust, was organized by Tiraspol University in Transnistria.